Official Languages committee  One thing to consider is jobs for international students. We discussed the English issue. I believe my colleague, Mariève Forest, who was here on Monday, told you about the barriers. Employers are hesitant to hire international students for all kinds of reasons. That makes job hu

Official Languages committee  If they're francophone immigrants, I would imagine their French is already pretty good. I'd like to add to my response earlier. If we want to make sure that francophone immigrants can maintain or improve their French, we need to enable them to live and receive services in French.

Official Languages committee  I have no idea. I don't know if it's even measurable. One could imagine calculating the number of applications by country of origin; that would give a percentage of people who did not manage to apply. On the other hand, there are other repercussions. People don't give up. They w

Official Languages committee  No, there is no telephone assistance. I don't think people can call unless they've submitted an application, received a number and been assigned an officer. Otherwise, there's no one to interact with.

Official Languages committee  I went to the website, as I was trying to help someone who asked me about the categories and how to apply. So I went to see for myself. I was clicking and going around in circles. The other difficulty is the number of categories that exist: permanent, temporary, student, this ki

Official Languages committee  The government has invested an enormous amount of money to make these services available to people who have obtained permanent residence, but are waiting for visas, papers or the time when they will leave their country. Many are unaware that pre-departure services exist. Sometim

Official Languages committee  The current system does seem unfair to me, given that the centres are concentrated and, as a result, in many countries, candidates sometimes have to travel for interviews, among other things. That said, a certain part of the process is now done online. So the current system puts

Official Languages committee  Family reunification, which I discussed—

Official Languages committee  You say “policy”?

Official Languages committee  The government can facilitate applications—as I was saying earlier concerning the way the procedure is in place—and then aim to select a certain group, or even simplify procedures or target certain categories.

Official Languages committee  To a certain extent, I think that, yes, there has been a major difference. When I was an international student, it was virtually impossible to become a permanent resident. Now it's already working much better for students. Yes, there have been enormous investments. However, all

Official Languages committee  Yes, I suggested mobile clinics, which don't need to be permanent and which can move around, or webinars.

Official Languages committee  The idea isn't to divide the department but rather to create an organization, an agency. As was pointed out earlier, the francophone communities aren't sovereign. They don't have authority over immigration, unlike Quebec, for example. One could imagine the provinces creating oth

Official Languages committee  Yes. One of the reasons for simplifying the process is that it would facilitate access to support in preparing applications for those wishing to file them. At the same time, if the criteria are different, that could facilitate and expedite file assessment while avoiding problems.

Official Languages committee  I think anglicization is hard to avoid because English is often the language of work. In my opinion, you have to retain French as the spoken language of the family and community participation. You can't avoid English. I've often advocated francization for anglophones. That's the